Apparatus for administering anaesthetic gases



R. vow FOREGGER. APPARATUS FOR ADMINISTERING ANIESTHETIC GA SES.

APPLICATION FILED SEPT.27, I917- 1A33JQ4. Patented Oct. 24, 1922. 2 SHEETS R. VON FOREGGER. APPARATUS FOR ADMINISTERING ANIESTHETIC GASES.

APPLICATION FILED SEPLZI, I917- 1,438,1M. Patented 001;. 24, 1922.

2 SHEETSSHET 2.

30 13 21 i7 2623 22 a '25 A ll Patented on. a4, 1922.

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RICHARD VON FOREGGER, OF ROSLYN, NEW YORK.

APPARATUS FOR ADIlTEINISTERING ANfESTI-IETIC GASES.

Application filed September 27,1917. Serial No. 193,593.

To all whom it may 00mm;

Eeit known that I, RICHARD von Fonnoem, a citizen of the United States of America, residing at Roslyn, Nassau County, State of New York, have invented a new and useful Apparatus for Administering Anaesthetic Gases, of which the following is a specification. v

The invention relates to improvements in apparatus for administering anaesthetic gases and especially apparatus for the simultaneous regulated administration of a number of gases such as nitrous oxide and oxygen. Its primary objects are to simplify suchapparatus and its management by eliminating the usual diaphragm type of. pressure-regulatingiand reducing valve, and to render it. more reliable inuse by practically eliminating the tendency of the gas passages to become stopped-by freezing, which often occurs from the sudden expansion of the :gases in diaphragm valves. These. and other results I secure by the substitution of a particular type. of control valve, hereinafter described, in place of the usual control-valve and the diaphragm reducing' valve, this single valve performing the duties of; both.

. i The .invention' is shown herein as embodied in a nitrous-oxide-oxygen apparatus comprising suitable means for supporting tankscf the gases under pressure and a sight feed device, and means for conducting the gas or gases to the patient. Fig.1. 1s a perspective. of. the apparatus. 1 Fig. v2 is a plan view of the head of the machine with the control valves, andlFig. 3 is anenlarged diagrammatic section on-line vofliig. 2. Referring first to Figure 1, the reference numeral 4: denotes a stand or support provided. with. a suitable. foot 5 to support it. At the upper end of the stand a bracket. 6, comprising a central portion? secured to the stand-by a bolt 8, see Fig. 2, supports the control valves 9 and. 10 and the tubes 11 and 12 leading therefrom to the yokes13 and 1a which are arranged to receive the nitrous oxide tanks 15, 15 andtheoxygen tanks 16, 1-6 in the usual-manner. From eachrof the control valves 9 and 10 'tubes 17 and 18' lead v to thesight feed 19 in which the gases bubble up'through water and whichis provided with a connection 21 for attachment to a suitable inhalation device 20.

It will thus be seenthat the apparatus designed'symmetrically with the nitrous 0xide tanks on the one side and the oxygen tanks on the other side, and the hand wheels 29 of the control valves 9 and 10 for the respective gases are preferably labelled as indicated in Figure 2 so as to avoid confusion.

In operation the gases pass from the tanks through their respective control valves into the sight feed and thence to the inhalation appliance The design of the control valves adapts them to give absolute control and regulation of the flow of the gases with substantially the same effect as obtained by the use of automatic pressure regulators, but without their inconveniences and uncertainties. These-valves serve to reduce the gas pres sure from thehigh pressure of the gas tank, frequently over a thousand pounds, to a pressure of a few inches of water as delivered to the inhaler and they maintain an equivalently uniform flow rate according to their adjustment. Each valve comprises a valve body having a tube 12 connecting With. the yoke 14 and a tube 11 connecting with the yoke 13. The bore 23 of the tube 12 and the bore 40 in tube 11 are both connected to ahorizontal channel 2% in the body of. the valve andthis channel opens into the lower end of a cylindrical valve seat 25,.in whicha cylindrical valve pin 26 of uniform diameter is adapted to be operated, i. e., raised andlowered, bymeans of the valve stem 27 in threaded engagement with the upper part of the valve body 22. The valve stem-passes. through a stuffing box 28 and is operated by means of a hand wheel 29. The valvebody is provided with an outlet tube 1.7 for connection with the sight feed 19. The boreSO of this tube leads from the valve chamber at the upper, end of the valve seat 25. When the valve stem is screwed down the valve pin 26 is moved down to the bottom part. of the valve seat 25 where it completely cuts off the supply of the gas from the tanks, preventing the gas from passing into the bore 30. When the'valve stem is rotated to screw it up, the flow may not start immediately because such rotation produces very little upward movement of the valve turning of the valve stem will increase the rate of flow. The pressure of the gas is thus reducedand its rate of flow regulated ing to the direction of turning, but neither movement changes the cross-area oi the crevice, since both valve and seat are cylindrical. That isto say, the line crevice be tween the valve and its seat, is a passageway of constant cross-area and the control is exercised by changing the length of the said crevice without changing itscross-area.

Such a valve 1 have found when the valve proper snugly fitted in the seat as shown in Fig. 3,, is well adapted to control the flow of anaesthetic gaseous materials from their high pressure sources to the low pressure outlet, in that, on the one hand, is capable or the finest ad ustment from a position in, which it permits the gas to pass 'not at all or so slowly that only single bubbles appear 111 thesight :leed, up to a position of maximum flow, and on the other handin it is able to make the very great pressure reduction between the source and the outlet with little if any likelihood of freezing l11'tl1e passage from rapid expansion. i

From the two control valves the gases pass through the tubes 17 and 18 tothe sight feed 19 which is preferably in the form of a glass bottle or vessel about half filled'with water 11. An annular groove or ridge 42 'may be blown in the vessel to serve as a mark for the water level. The space 60 withln the vessel 19 forms a mixlng chamber for the gases. For the sake of c learness the tubes 17 and 18 are shown in Figure 3'as extending in opposite directions to their respective control valves 9 and 10. The arrangement ot these partsis shown in the preferred form in Figure 2. The gases pass from thetubes 17 and 18 into the two tubes 18 and 1% which extend to near the bottom of the vessel 19. The tube 43 communicates with the tube 17 for thesupply of nitrous oxide and the tube 461 communicates with the tube 18 for the supply of oxygen. Below the water level the tube 13 is provided with five spaced holes 45, while the tube 11 has four spaced'holes The holes 15 and 46 occupy the same lengths on their respective tubes as shown. The holes 15 are approximately three times the size of the holes 46. By means of this arrangement the actual flow of the gas and oxygen may be observed and the proper proportion ob tained conveniently. Itis well known that the sudden expansion oi nitrous J oxide (or carbon dioxide) when entering the chamber of a diaphragm reducing valve causes such lowering of temperature that the gas is apt to freeze whereby the gas passage becomes clogged and the gas flows irregularly ing wide the usual tanlcvalves 5l and 52 on the tanks 15 and 16 and permitting the gases to pass through the-tubes 11 and 12 to the control valves by means of which the flows are adjusted as desired, and thence by way of the tubes 17 and 18 to the sight teed and from the latter to the inhalation appliance, it being understood that onextank 15 and one tank 16 is used at a time and the two other tanks 15 and 16 arefor reserve.

As shown in Fig. 1, thesight feedf19 may be supported above the tanks by simply arranging the tubes 17 and 18 accordingly, and the entire apparatus is preferably arranged symmetrically for ease of operation and accessibility, which features are also clearly apparent from an inspection of F igure 2. It is of course not necessary that there should be four tanks or that they should be of the same size. The number of tanksbeyond two, onecont'aining the nit-rousoxlde and one the oxygen, 18 immaterial, as is hkewlse the position of the sight feed.

valves are set and renders the apparatus practically automatic in operation.

It will further be understood that I do not wish to limit my invention by thedisjclosuer herein otherwise than required by the scope of the appended claims.

1. In an anaesthetic apparatus, the combination of a source of gas under pressure. an inhalation appliance, and an interposed manually operated control valve comprising two members PIOVlCliIig' a crevice forming apart of the passage connecting said source and inhalation appliance, said members being relatively movable at will to change the length of the crevice without substantiallychanging its. cross area, thereby varying the rate of flow in proportion to said change of length.

2. In an anaesthetic apparatus, the com bination with a source of gas under pressure an inhalation appliance, and an interposed manually operated control valve com prising a cylindrical seat and a closely fitting cylindrical valve pin therein providing an annular crevice through which the gas flows axially of the valve pin whereby the pressure of the gas is reduced, the cylindrical pin being movable axially within its enclosing cylindrical seat, to control the rate of flow, at the will of the operator 3. In an anesthetizing apparatus, the combination with a gas tank, a manually operated control valve, means for detachably connecting the tank and valve, and an inhalation appliance for receiving gas from the valve, said valve comprising a cylindrical valve seat and aclosely fitting cylindrical valve pin therein through. the crevice between which the gas passes axially, the pin being movable axially by the operator to change the length of the crevice.

4. An anesthetizing apparatus comprising in combination with the source of anaesthetic gas under pressure, the inhalation appliance and the connecting tubing of a manually operated regulating valve comprising two members closely fitted to each other to form between them a minute crevice constituting the connection between the high and low pressure sides of the valve and means for moving one of said members to change the length of the crevice the width of said crevice being predetermined to cause such member-movement to produce an anaesthetic range of flow variation without other means for pressure reduction or regulation. Y

In testimony whereo specification.

RICHARD voiv FOREGGER.

I have signed this 

